


Don't

by Comicbooklovergreen, WildnessBecomesYou



Category: Ratched (TV)
Genre: Allusions to Childhood Abuse, Angst, F/F, Flashbacks, PTSD, but it's all very tense and sad, with a resolution!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-19
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:14:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27110293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Comicbooklovergreen/pseuds/Comicbooklovergreen, https://archiveofourown.org/users/WildnessBecomesYou/pseuds/WildnessBecomesYou
Summary: It's been a bad day for Gwendolyn. She makes it worse when she slams her hand down on the counter.
Relationships: Gwendolyn Briggs/Mildred Ratched
Comments: 39
Kudos: 225
Collections: NC_Favs





	Don't

**Author's Note:**

> Hi hello this was borne from one of the first conversations I had with Comicbooklovergreen, and y'all, we did a good job with the angst here. 
> 
> BUT NOBODY DIES I SWEAR. 
> 
> Just maybe prep y'allselves some hot chocolate, because it's a bit rough, and because I still want you to feel okay when you're done reading, okay? 
> 
> <3

Gwendolyn works very hard at making sure Mildred feels safe. She knows the woman has been through far too much to always feel that way, but she works at making their home a good place, one that protects her. She holds Mildred with gentle arms, soft hands, takes it all slower than she might have if Mildred were some other woman. She tries to give more than she takes. 

But Gwendolyn Briggs is only human. 

It’s been a bad day. She’d been late to her appointment, and there had been absolutely no progress on the tumor despite the pain of it all. The poor attending nurse had tried to reassure her, tell her that progress would take time, even with such an aggressive treatment. And she did believe the nurse. But it didn’t really help. And then on the drive to the store she’d hit every red light possible; at the store she seemed to be invisible to everyone around her, shoulders bumping hers painfully without so much as an apology. 

Mildred arrives home at the same time she does, even though she ought to have been home ages before Mildred. She relaxes just a little at the sight of Mildred. The anger still simmers under the surface of her skin, though, and she tries to push it down further as Mildred mentions the little details of her day. She smiles, though it’s tight. 

She knows Mildred notices. Her shoulders come up just slightly and she fiddles with her hands, with her fork during dinner. She’s nervous, it’s obvious, she’s tense, and Gwendolyn is still too angry herself to help her relax. She starts to clear up after dinner instead, hoping that doing something will ease her mind. 

“You haven’t told me anything about your day,” Mildred says, slipping in beside her to place her plate in the sink. 

Gwendolyn shakes her head. “It wasn’t a very good one.”

Mildred tenses a bit, moves back over to the table. “I still don’t mind hearing about it.”

Gwendolyn knows she’s trying to be kind. She knows she’s trying to help, but all Gwendolyn wants is for this day to be over, so she can go to sleep and wake up and start over. And God, she loves Mildred. She knows Mildred loves her. But they’re so new, and Mildred doesn’t know that she wants some quiet, and Gwendolyn can’t find the words to tell her that. She wishes she did. 

But all she has is her body, and she can feel the frustration of everything, and she needs a physical outlet. So she slaps a palm on the counter— it’s what she’s always done, and Trevor had always known it was a sign to leave her alone. 

And immediately, she knows it was a mistake. 

Mildred jumps about a foot in the air. Gwendolyn turns to look, frown still tugging her lips down and— 

Suddenly all the anger goes out of Gwendolyn— she’s only got space for regret, because she can see the present leaving Mildred. She can see that blankness replacing the light in Mildred’s eyes. She can see the thoughts running through Mildred’s head, and— 

Fuck, she’d caused this. She’d done this to Mildred. 

And Mildred is heaving in breaths, but it’s not out of anger, or frustration. It’s something worse, something darker. 

Mildred can’t breathe. 

There’s the issue— she can’t breathe, and her body is shaking, and she’d thought Gwendolyn had been tense but she hadn’t realized she was pushing the wrong buttons. 

Gwendolyn feels lost; she doesn’t know what to do here, she’s never has Mildred afraid of _her_. She’s never seen Mildred react like this, never set off this tripwire. She’s never _caused_ this. She wants to go to Mildred, hold her, make it all go away. But she can’t. She can’t approach her, because that would make the fear worse. But she can’t do nothing; it’s not her in nature to do nothing. 

God, she feels so helpless. And it’s the first time she’s felt this helpless. It’s the first time she’s really had no read on what to do, no intuitive response. Gwendolyn is a patient being, most of the time, and she is stubborn, so she eventually finds a solution. She evens out her voice as much as she can, keeps her hands in view, murmurs, “I’m not angry at you, I’m angry at everything else.” 

And it’s so hard pretend stay calm, but she has to. Mildred can’t be calm, so she has to be, she has to be the strong one here. 

“Don’t!”

It’s one word, but there’s so much there.

There’s the crack in her voice, the trembling of her hands as they come up to shield her, the stumble in her feet. And it doesn’t occur to Gwendolyn what that means, at first. In fact she’s trying to figure it out— Don’t come near me? Don’t say anything?

But then she realizes it’s “please don’t hit me,” and that’s when her heart breaks again.

It does that a lot, with Mildred, she’s beginning to learn.

Gwendolyn feels almost sick. Literally, she could throw up right there, when it hits, when she gets it. Because she never would, she would never hurt Mildred, never touch her like that. Her fingers, her palms, her fists don’t curl that way.

But she doesn’t know if Mildred will believe her.

And Mildred is curled up against the wall, eyes squeezed shut, waiting for impact like when it finally hits she can let it bounce off the wall and away.

Gwendolyn's mind is so near broken with this that she doesn't know how to make Mildred understand. How to pull her out of something Gwen directly caused. Not intentionally, but that doesn't matter.

Because it was her. She that caused this. And she’d never meant for it to be this way, never thought it would ever be her, she was always supposed to protect Mildred. But she isn’t here protecting anymore, no, now she’s the one doing the harm. And it’s wrong. God, it’s all so wrong— 

Gwendolyn promised she'd never, ever hurt Mildred. Promised it a lot. And now she's cowering and shaking and she's not Mildred, and her whole body is literally braced for impact and Gwendolyn doesn't know how to…

Gwendolyn doesn't know how to fix this. This isn't even her Mildred anymore. It's the scared little girl Gwendolyn has pictured from the scraps of stories she's gotten. The scared little girl waiting for a hit from someone bigger, stronger. Someone threatening. The picture that’s always broken Gwendolyn’s heart. 

And Gwendolyn doesn’t know how to convince her. She doesn’t have the right words, not really.

There’s not much she can say, actually. Not much other than—

“I won’t, Mildred. Please put your hands down.”

But Mildred's hearing more of her own blood rushing through her, ringing in her ears. Familiar sounds that are much more familiar than Gwendolyn's voice, honestly. Sounds that leave a deeper imprint, echo in her bones. So Gwendolyn takes a single step, and she repeats herself:

“I’m not going to hurt you, Mildred, darling, please put your hands down.”

And she isn’t expecting what comes out of Mildred's mouth next—

“Just fucking hit me already!”

Those words are a knife in Gwendolyn’s heart, and her eyes well with tears she should be holding back, because Mildred deserves bravery. “No.”

Mildred is shaking, back against the wall, hands fisted by her side. But her eyes are squeezed shut, ready for impact.

There are places Gwendolyn can’t touch. She knows that. There’s places where, if her fingers land, Mildred will sink further away until Gwendolyn is left with only her skin, only a dried out husk.

"I won't hit you, darling. I will never, ever hit you." Gwendolyn's voice is slightly steadier now, stronger, but it's still not the usual tone she has in these moments, and she knows it. It doesn’t sound full enough, warm enough. "Mildred? I will never hit you. Never." It's not a false promise, but Gwendolyn could see how Mildred would read it like that. Easily, especially after what’s just happened. And Mildred still isn’t looking at her.

Gwendolyn is afraid. Afraid that she’s lost Mildred, that she’ll sink into the wallpaper and never have existed, afraid that when her eyes open, the curious and energetic and too-loyal girl will be gone. But the only thing she can think of is to touch. If Mildred won’t listen to words— can’t— she has to try something.

So she reaches out, her hands trembling almost as much as Mildred herself, and cups the poor shaken thing’s face in her hands. And it's almost like they're bracing for impact now.

Mildred screams and drops, and Gwendolyn follows. She’s blessedly able to cushion the back of Mildred’s head before it hits the ground.

Impact hits.

Mildred thrashes, a knee flying up to Gwendolyn’s stomach, and she’s physically winded just as much as she had been emotionally.

A distant part of her thinks maybe she deserved that.

Mildred's trying for a fetal position, trying to make herself small. But her fingers are in her own hair, pulling hard enough to hurt. If she hurts herself first, gives herself a different pain to focus on, it's easier. If she hurts herself first, some control.

_Not that she usually had the time for that._

And different fingers are in her hair now, trying to stop her nails from scratching, and she digs in to fight back.

"No. No, no, no, sweetheart, don't.” Gwendolyn is talking past the hit to her stomach, and she still doesn't entirely have her air back, but she's still breathing better than Mildred is. Mildred is all choked gasps and whimpers and noises Gwendolyn's much too familiar with, but not like this.

Mildred’s fingers release from her own hair, go to her shoulders. She can dig in there, she can protect herself and introduce the pain so it’s lessened. And those fingers follow, trying to interfere, trying to prevent her, and isn’t that cruel of them?

She just needs to do this. If she can distract from the coming blows, Gwendolyn can do whatever she wants, whatever she has to— Mildred just needs to do this. 

Just give her this.

“Please, Mildred,” she hears, and it’s so soft and broken and she knows that tone. She knows the child in that tone, the begging, the fear and the desperation.

“Please don’t hurt yourself.”

And dammit, it's not fair. She can't ignore that tone. It's not fair that she can’t. Her fingers flex open.

“Please, Mildred, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

_I wish that we were— I wish that I could have met Mildred Ratched before the world got to her._

And the impact of the world leaves Mildred gasping, and it hurts almost more than the back of a hand against her face would have. She's baffled. Why would Gwendolyn apologize? She's not doing any of this how she's supposed to.

Gwendolyn’s head is bowed before her, sobs shaking her body, and Mildred knows that’s not how this is supposed to work. She's taken too long to land a blow, and then she said Mildred wasn't supposed to hurt, and now she's apologizing and crying like she's the one who was bad and Mildred doesn't get this. It doesn’t make sense. 

Her fingers find the nape of Gwendolyn’s neck, and the woman bows her head even further, forehead touching Mildred’s sternum.

Why is Gwendolyn crying?

Gwendolyn's crying and upset and Mildred can't have that. She has to stop that even more than she has to protect herself from getting hit. She tells Gwendolyn she's sorry. It's okay, it's okay. She's sorry.

Somehow that makes it worse. Gwendolyn cries harder.

Gwendolyn wants to strike something. This isn’t fair, and she’s been taught to fight injustices, to protect those who need it, but if she pounds the ground for its crimes against Mildred the woman will only startle further. She wants to yell that it's not okay. It's not okay, it's never been okay— but she can't do that.

She wants to pull Mildred closer, hold her until their skin merges and she can speak to Mildred’s soul in the way it deserves to be spoken to. But there are words she cannot say and places she cannot touch and things she should have known better than to do.

She wants to prove to Mildred what's there, that she loves her so much. That Mildred never, ever has to shrink from her. That she'd never hurt her deliberately. She'd never deliberately cause Mildred pain.

Mildred’s fingers have started to move against her skin.

There isn’t a way to say any of this, not so that Mildred will believe it, down in her instincts. And she barely knows how to try to prove it.

“I’m so sorry,” she says again, and it feels too little.

The touch is better, and worse. Mildred's touching her like Mildred again, gentle, loving. And that's good, but she doesn't deserve it. Mildred's hurt and scared, and she's still trying to make Gwendolyn okay.

She risks a hand to a shoulder, and Mildred doesn’t jerk away. Mildred puts her opposite hand over Gwendolyn's, covers it. "Please don't cry? Please?”

She wants to make it better for Gwen, she always does. Because she can't be ok if Gwen isn’t.

And Gwendolyn can’t stop the tears, but she presses their foreheads together, brings up her hand to cup Mildred’s cheek. She swallows until the lump in her throat is gone, until she thinks if she can just get a good breath in maybe she can say something that will mean something.

Mildred's cheek is red and wet from her own tears, tears Gwen caused, and it makes it harder to focus, but she needs to. She needs to do something right here, for once.

“I’ll never— I’m not—“

False starts.

“Please,” is the next thing that leaves her lips, and at least that feels like something. “Please, Mildred, please believe me.”

And Mildred's eyes go wide at that. Because it's not Gwendolyn. The tone isn’t— it's not strong, it's too pleading, and not like when they're in bed together and she’s begging, it’s too small and weak— and Mildred will do anything to make that tone go away.

“I’m not them,” Gwendolyn breathes, “I’m not them, please believe that, I could never be them.”

She wants to shield Mildred from the world, take away all the things that have happened to her. But she can’t. And she knows, she knows this isn’t a switch you flip. She knows this kind of pain can’t be solved with a plea and a promise. But there’s nothing else she can do, braced atop her like this on the kitchen floor.

"Gwendolyn..." Mildred's lost her breath again, but for a different reason.

"Please. I wouldn't— I wouldn't do what they did." She'd die first, her heart would stop beating, before she put an angry hand on Mildred, a hand set out to hurt. But she can't say that and she knows it. Too much history, too much fear. Any mention of her death, in any context, will make Mildred spiral again.

“I know,” Mildred says. But Gwendolyn knows that’s not true, shakes her head. She knows Mildred's just saying it, saying what she thinks will make Gwendolyn stop hurting. She knows the difference.

The scene echoing off the walls is enough to prove that.

She doesn't know how they got here. How she let them get here. A stressful day, an unthinking moment, and suddenly everything they are feels fragile, in a way it never has. She'd had a bad day and now they're huddled on the floor, like this.

Gwendolyn wants to take the fragile thing that they are and protect it, but how do you protect something when you’re the one to hurt it in the first place?

She takes Mildred’s hand and brings it to her chest, presses the knuckles into her skin until she feels her own heartbeat. “Do you feel that?” she asks.

Mildred nods mutely.

Because of course— of course she feels it. Why wouldn't she? She falls asleep to it at night and sometimes it even keeps the monsters away, all night.

“Do you know you have that?” Gwendolyn asks. Because it’s true. Mildred holds her heart. Mildred occupies it, surrounds it, holds it in her tiny, fragile hands. “It’s yours.”

She offers it, just like that, knuckles pressed to her skin.

“And I will never, ever use it against you.”

“These hands,” Gwendolyn continues, and she doesn’t know if this will work but she has to try, fingers squeezing against Mildred. “These hands belong to that heart, which belongs to you, and I could never, ever, use them against you.”

And the look on Mildred's face, the fresh tears in her eyes as she tries to process this. It's maybe the rawest thing Gwen's ever said to her, and that's saying something.

“I promise, as long as this heart beats,” Gwendolyn says, and her voice breaks, but she keeps going, tries to ignore the tears in Mildred’s eyes for just a few moments longer, “I will never hurt you.”

It's too much. It's more than Mildred can process. It's so raw, so exposed, it leaves Gwendolyn so open and vulnerable. Mildred just wants to hold her and shield her, so she does. She tries for Gwendolyn's name, but it's choked, not even she recognizes it as her voice. She's being offered too much and she doesn't know how to take it, but she grabs onto Gwendolyn anyway. Because she has to; it's the only thing that feels safe when things are this open. When there's so much, too much. 

And Gwendolyn is there, her heartbeat loud in Mildred’s veins, and it’s all so much, and she needs all of it.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed! 
> 
> I'm hoping to pick back up with writing after Wednesday-- it's been a stressful month at work, but it's resolving somewhat after then. And hopefully things will get a little quieter in my town so I don't get those blasted headaches. 
> 
> Thanks for sticking with me, y'all. It means a lot that you still want to read even when I'm not cranking out one or two fics a day. Big love to ya <3


End file.
